A 25-year-old man was stabbed with a homemade blade inside a housing unit at a Paynesville treatment facility early Tuesday, and by that evening, the man accused of attacking him was sitting in the Stearns County Jail. The two men knew each other and both lived at the facility on the 300 block of Washburne Avenue, where deputies say the assault unfolded before dawn.
The Stearns County Sheriff's Office received a 911 call about the assault at roughly 12:25 a.m. Tuesday, according to WJON. Investigators say the 27-year-old suspect fled the scene before officers arrived, but Stearns County sheriff's deputies and Paynesville police officers tracked him down and arrested him later that same day. He remains held in the Stearns County Jail awaiting formal charges, the station reports.
The weapon used in the attack was a homemade blade, and the assault itself was a stabbing, according to KNSI, which offered more detail than initial sheriff's office statements describing only a homemade bladed weapon. The 25-year-old victim was taken to Paynesville Hospital, per the WJON report, and treated for non-life-threatening injuries before being released. KNSI further identified the facility as CentraCare Paynesville Hospital, where he was treated and released the same day.
A Corridor Lined With Care Facilities
Washburne Avenue sits in a stretch of Paynesville dotted with residential and treatment properties. Washburne Court, an assisted living facility, sits at 311 Washburne Ave, while addiction treatment provider Mae Maurer Rogers operates nearby at 109 Washburne Ave, according to background gathered from CentraCare and Drug-Rehabs.org listings. Law enforcement has not released the specific trade name of the property where the assault occurred, only describing it as a treatment facility housing unit.
CentraCare Health Paynesville Hospital is a 36-bed critical access facility with emergency care and an average wait time of 104 minutes, faster than Minnesota's statewide average of 123 minutes, per CentraCare Health System data. That quick turnaround lines up with the victim being evaluated and released the same day the assault occurred.
What Charges the Suspect Could Face
Under Minnesota Statutes § 609.222, assault with a dangerous weapon is charged as second-degree assault, a felony that carries up to seven years in prison and a $14,000 fine — or up to 10 years if the victim suffers substantial bodily harm, according to the Minnesota Revisor of Statutes. No formal charges had been filed as of Wednesday, and the suspect's full identity has not been released pending that filing.
Violent incidents inside licensed residential care or treatment facilities also trigger separate reporting obligations. Under the Minnesota Vulnerable Adults Act, acts of physical violence or maltreatment in licensed housing must be reported to the Minnesota Adult Abuse Reporting Center and can draw administrative review from state bodies such as the Department of Human Services, per Stearns County's own guidance on the law. It remains unresolved whether state health regulators will open a separate administrative investigation into the Washburne Avenue facility.
A Rural County Handling a String of Blade Attacks
Paynesville is a small city of 2,388 residents, according to 2020 U.S. Census Bureau figures, located about 30 miles southwest of St. Cloud — the kind of small town where municipal police routinely lean on the Stearns County Sheriff's Office for major felony investigations. Sheriff Steve Soyka's office, which is leading this case alongside Paynesville police, announced a new mobile app in July for real-time public safety alerts, tip submissions, and jail inmate tracking, according to the Stearns County Sheriff's Office.
This is not an isolated case for the county's edged-weapon prosecutions. Hoodline reported in July that Stearns County prosecutors charged two teens in a late-night stabbing in St. Cloud that left a victim with a punctured lung. And in February, a 19-year-old was charged with felony second-degree assault after allegedly attacking someone with a box cutter in a St. Cloud parking lot, Hoodline reported at the time. Paynesville itself has drawn scrutiny before: Hoodline covered a fatal domestic incident in the city last year involving an 80-year-old man and a Stearns County Sheriff's deputy placed on leave pending a BCA investigation.
For now, the criminal case against the 27-year-old suspect remains in its earliest stages, with formal charges from the Stearns County Attorney's Office still pending. Investigators have not disclosed what led to the confrontation between the two men, who lived in the same housing unit.
